Universal Credit and Personal Independence Payment Bill

Vicky Foxcroft Excerpts

2nd reading
Tuesday 1st July 2025 Commons Chamber

[Vicky Foxcroft (Lewisham North) (Lab)]

I begin by welcoming the positive steps the Department has set out in the “Pathways to Work” Green Paper on supporting people into work; the right to try work without the fear of having to go through reassessment for benefits if it does not work out; reforming and modernising the Access to Work system; disability pay gap reporting; disability employment gap reporting; ensuring everyone has access to a supportive work coach; the assessment process, and ensuring that assessments are recorded as standard, which people were desperately crying out for; and ensuring people with lifelong conditions do not need to be reassessed when we know their condition is unlikely to ever improve. I also welcome many of the concessions the Government have made over the past week: bringing forward employment support, introducing protections for current PIP claimants going forward, and recognising the need for co-production.

However, I continue to have some concerns, which I believe must be addressed. We need the Timms review to report before the new system is rolled out. On co-production, I want to start by saying that this should have happened way before we got to today’s debate. I know from my time as shadow Minister for disabled people that when we work with disabled people and their organisations from the start, we produce better policy. There is so much talent out there and, like many of us in the Chamber, disabled people and their organisations want reform of the benefits system, but the reforms set out in the Bill are not what they want or need. We should have been working with them on it right from the start.

[Anna Dixon (Shipley) (Lab)]

I thank my hon. Friend for her remarks. Does she agree that, as well as having meaningful engagement with disabled people themselves and disabled groups, it is really important that the Timms review engages with unpaid family carers, both because they are caring for people with disability and because they are implicated through carer’s allowance being linked to PIP?

[Vicky Foxcroft]

I absolutely agree. The review needs to ensure that it has the right engagement and consultation with everybody, but it must be co-produced with the experts by experience.

I want to take this opportunity to clarify exactly what we mean by co-production. The principle of co-production is rooted in the US civil rights movement and the ladder of citizen participation developed by Sherry Arnstein in 1969. It should be in place from the start of the process. All information should be made available to everyone. A plan should be agreed together. There must be the ability to bring in experts. These experts should be paid for their contribution and treated as valued partners. We should empower and upskill those who are involved. And I hope that it goes without saying, but all information should be available in accessible formats. The valued partners need to be user-led disabled people’s organisations.

I finish by underlining that the focus of making the changes should not be on making cuts, but on getting it right. The focus on getting it right means that everything needs to be in scope of the review, not just the ability to tinker within limited predetermined parameters. Co-production must take place before any changes to the current assessment criteria are proposed. If that means pausing to ensure that we get it right, then that is what we must do.